Patches Kennedy got re-elected, I see.
Posted on 11/11/2006 8:19:55 AM PST by Graybeard58
PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Sen. Lincoln Chafee said his knees buckled when he walked into his polling place Tuesday morning and saw that voters were given a prominently displayed option of casting votes along a straight-party line.
"It was so easy to just go against the Republicans and fill in that Democrat. It was so easy," Chafee said Thursday in a post-mortem dissection of his loss to Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse.
Voters in Rhode Island did exactly that on Tuesday, filling in Democrats in large numbers and sweeping the Republican Chafee from office as part of a fierce backlash that uprooted GOP incumbents across the country.
Rhode Island is in the minority of states where voters can select candidates entirely from the same party with just a single mark or punch on their ballots. The straight party option is available in just over a dozen states, largely in the south and the Midwest.
"I don't know that there's a good or a bad or a right or a wrong," said Kathleen Dolan, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee who is originally from Rhode Island. "It depends on your perspective."
Though political parties may favor the option as a way to entrench their power in states where they dominate, critics say it can discourage thoughtful voting by allowing citizens to cast purely partisan votes without deciding on individual races or for individual candidates.
"Every voter ought to look at each race that he or she is voting for," said Richard Winger, editor of Ballot Access News, a California-based publication. "It just takes away from thinking."
The Rhode Island Board of Elections says 61,000 voters cast a straight-party ballot for the Democrats by connecting an arrow at the top of their ballot. The number of straight-party ballots for Republican candidates was more than 18,300, according to the elections board.
Republican Gov. Don Carcieri was the lone member of his party elected to state office, and even he survived a closer-than-expected fight.
The option is a carry-over from lever machines the state used until a decade ago.
"The law was written to ensure that the equipment would allow for the same kind of straight-party voting," said Peter Kerwin, a spokesman for the secretary of state's office.
But the number of states with the option has been declining.
Missouri eliminated straight-ticket voting this year, and Illinois abolished it in the late 1990s. The Kentucky secretary of state proposed getting rid of the option this year, but the idea stalled in the state legislature.
"It's something that we're going to continue to push for," said Les Fugate, a spokesman for the office. "It's not going away."
David Kimball, a political science professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, said party-line voting tends to be more convenient for voters and yields more residual votes in races located farther down on the ballot -- which typically receive less attention and publicity.
On the other hand, he added, voters may think they're done after casting a straight-party vote and then fail to mark their preferences on ballot initiatives.
"Of course, it's a political hotball," said Megan Mullin, an assistant political science professor at Temple University in Philadelphia,
She said she doubted Chafee's loss could be attributed simply to party-line voting, especially since the race got so much publicity and because a Republican governor was able to win re-election.
The typical casualty of straight-party voting would be a lesser-known candidate whose race is listed lower on the ballot.
"Is it possible that Chafee lost a few votes because of the party vote? Absolutely," Mullin said, but later added, "I find it hard to believe that the effect of the party ballot was enough to take the Senate seat away from Lincoln Chafee."
Apparently it's everybody's fault except his own!
So happy to learn the real reason this back stabbing worthless coward got beat. I thoght it was because he was a lousy Senator. Who knew?
We have party line ballots too but that doesn't cause me to vote straight ticket. I vote taxpayers party on school administration type races.
I heard this POS on WRKO-Boston yesterday say he was happy the Dems took over Congress.
I guess it's back to shoeing horses for Linc the RINO.
Let me get this straight; You're a United States Senator running for re-election and you Don't know how the ballot is laid out before hand?
Unbelievable.
Patches Kennedy got re-elected, I see.
How can an Ass shoe a Horse?
Cry me a river RINO.
I have wondered about how many actually did vote straight Party. A friend of mine claimed that's what he was going to do, since he supported a Dem for Sheriff and he didn't like Chocola OR Donnely. A very ugly campaign. Move-on sponsored hit job.
He even agreed with me that Pelosi was opposite of everything he believes in.
But I saw where they get their news. The alpabets and a local paper that features only AP articles.
And BTW....the straight party option has always been the first option in every election I've voted in since 1974.
2 reasons
Lincoln
Chafee
Somehow that party ticket didn't keep Republican governor Don Carcieri from geting re-elected.
Time to think up another excuse, big'un.
Far from discouraging, this is a hopeful trend. It means that once again, principles are becoming ascendant in the GOP ranks, instead of expediency.
Fair warning, John McCain, Chuck Hagel, Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, Arlen Specter ...
Maybe they thought you was a Demonrat
The local PA papers and local TV are much more creative. Between the AP articles, they post their own articles trashing anyone with an (R) after his name beginning BEFORE the voting has begun in the previous election. In case you don't subscribe to their rags or can't read, the local TV news reports on the newspaper articles. It's like an incessant echo chamber and now that they know how to totally corrupt the voting patterns in the PA "T", the previously red part of the state, PA has turned deep blue and will no doubt stay that way.
Excuses, excuses...You're a loser, Lincoln.
He lost because the New Hampshire voters could see he was a weakling with no principles. Better to vote for a dog - at least you know which way the dog is going to jump. Same thing with Kean.
It couldn't possibly have been him! :-)
Well, of course. Right and wrong ALWAYS depend on your perspective. !!!</sarcasm>
Indiana went from 7 (R)- 2 (D) to 4(R)- 5(D)
The media has helped pave the way for Bayh with this years campaigning, also
Answer: absolutely nothing
About the only good thing to come out of this mess is that bleeping jerk is GONE!!
Lincoln, walk over to the Reflecting Pool to see who is to blame. It's close to the other Lincoln who was a real Republican.
When libs lose, they blame everybody else but yourself.
Repubs lose, then try to find out why they lost and move on.
Ain't it the truth! Notice how there are absolutely no tales of widespread dis-em-enfranchisement? No cold and rain only in the dim precincts? And also unlike 2004, no reports of people seeking treatment for post-election stress disorder? Guess the moonbats are the only one weak enough to need that kind of pick me up when they lose.
Rush touched on this the other day too.
wah! Nobody likes a traitor not even the traitorees.
what an a-hole....Ann Coulter was so right....they shot the wrong Lincoln!!!
be a man...stand up and say one lib/dem lsot to another lib/dem!!!!!
Lincoln Chafee is a LOSER. I hope he goes over to the RATS.
It is hard to believe that John Chaffee raised this little turd.
A bunch of "blind party loyality over country" people have been on FR cheerleading for everyone to vote "straight ticket Republican" regardless of who the candidate is. It's that kind of thinking that got us Jeffords and almost got Senator Chafee re-elected so he could caucus with the Dems. By blindly voting for ANY "R", all they're doing is using GOP money to electing liberals who with carry out the Democrats agenda.
I voted 90% Republican last week, but I did so because the INDIVIDUAL candiate in EACH race who happened to be better was the Republican. 90% of the time, the Republican IS better, but voters should be educated and informed to know where their candidates stand in every office to determine that.
I have no respect for people who blindly punch "D" or "R" on the ballot and do not give a crap whether the person for each office is honest, qualified, conservative, etc. Straight party voting gives us lying corrupt scumbags like Jim Jeffords (R), George Ryan (R), Robert Toricelli (D), Alan Heveri (D), etc. How did they win? Their voters didn't even notice they were running -- all they cared was whether they had a "D" or "R" next to their name.
the voters , my fellow citizens, are stupid, most of them...stupid or ignorant of lazy thinkers.....
there has got to be billionaires out there who think conservatively ...why are they not buying up and managing more of the media, newspapers included...
Wow. How Dumb-o-crat of him. Call the waaaambulance.
On second thought, *do* let the door hit ya on the way out, Suzy Chafee.
RINOs like him are why we're looking at a bleak 2 years.
spend more time and money backing candidates that you approve of before the general election....
the political scene is a sad state of affairs, but electing Rats, who are clannish and support each other to a fault, who never throw anyone under the bus... you vote for a Rat congressman, you are voting for Rat judges and rat appointees.... the old Rat party wasn't like that ...I suppose there was time when they really did speak for the little people.....
What I said is blindly voting straight ticket Republican is idiotic and people should decide on the races individually. Chafee is deserving of ZERO support from Republicans. Time and money used to help Chafee could have been better spent helping Talent, Allen, Burns, and Steele. Instead people wanted to endorse Chafee's re-election solely because he had an "R" next to his name.
The powers that be in the GOP should be neutral in a primary, but THEY donated plenty of time and effort to derail Steve Laffey so that POS Linc Chafee was renominated. Chafee was NOT the choice of the GOP voters and wouldn't have won the primary without outside interferance. Once Chafee was shoved down our throats in the primary, we should have abanonded him and went to work for decent Republicans deserving of our support. If we had done so, we'd still control the Senate today.
The ONLY conservative newspaper in PA that I know of is the Tribune Review owned by Scaife, the gazillionaire the Democrats accused of running some kind of stealth campaign to smear (the Arkansas Project) Clinton. He owns a bunch of little papers in a ring around P'burgh in addition to the T-R, but he certainly doesn't hire the editorial or news staff of any of them from the looks of them. He is slowly but surely putting the toxic Post-Gazette, the only remaining P'burgh city paper out of business, but nobody, neither conservative nor liberal, is much interested in buying newspapers. It won't be long until most graduates coming out of the public schools will not be able to read well enough to understand a news article, so that's understandable.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." -Manuel II Paleologus
That's actually not Chafee's problem, unfortunately. He had 60 something % approval ratings.
It's just that RI is a nutcase D state and they wanted a nutcase D, not a nutcase R.
Straight party balloting killed the GOP in NH, too. Lynch was strong at the top of the ticket and people here hated Bush so much that the NH House and Senate Dem candidates were swept in after beating long-time GOP officials of all political persuasions (from very conservative to very liberal, so there was no real rhyme or reason to booting all of them out) and it killed Bradley and Bass (Bradley, moreso). No one who studies state politics expected the landslide win for Democrats in the House and Senate, even though many believed both houses would go Dem. It was the proverbial tsunami that analysts were talking about on the national scale in congressional races that didn't exactly happen.
Republican Gov. Don Carcieri was the lone member of his party elected to state office, and even he survived a closer-than-expected fight.
Carcieri is known for standing up to the Democrat legislature and demanding fiscal responsibility. In short, the conservative in this election survived.
Regards, Ivan
Senator Chafee: Just go away, putz.
Funny how in Florida, Democrats called this "politicking" in the Foley-Negron district.
-PJ
Were they reacting to the Christian wing of the GOP or the war in Iraq?
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